Wildfire near Yosemite surges to 84 square miles

Friday

Aug 23, 2013 at 12:01 AMAug 23, 2013 at 2:40 AM

FRESNO, Calif. — A wildfire outside Yosemite National Park more than tripled in size Thursday, shutting down businesses in surrounding communities and leading scores of tourists to leave the area during peak season.

By GOSIA WOZNIACKA

FRESNO, Calif. — A wildfire outside Yosemite National Park more than tripled in size Thursday, shutting down businesses in surrounding communities and leading scores of tourists to leave the area during peak season.

California Gov. Jerry Brown declared a state of emergency because of the huge fire, one of several blazes burning in or near the nation's national parks and one of 50 major uncontained fires burning across the West.

Fire officials said the blaze near Yosemite, which threatens several thousand homes, hotels and camp buildings, had grown to more than 84 square miles and was only 2 percent contained Thursday, down from 5 percent a day earlier. Two homes and seven outbuildings have been destroyed.

While the park remains open, the blaze has caused the closure of a 4-mile stretch of State Route 120, one of three entrances into Yosemite on the west side, devastating areas that live off of park-fueled tourism.

Officials have advised voluntary evacuations of the gated summer community of Pine Mountain Lake, population 2,800, other area residences, several organized camps, and at least two campgrounds.

More homes, businesses and hotels are threatened in nearby Groveland, a community of 600 about five miles from the fire and 25 miles from the entrance of Yosemite. "Usually during summer, it's swamped with tourists, you can't find parking downtown," said Christina Wilkinson, who runs Groveland's social media pages and lives in Pine Mountain Lake. "Now, the streets are empty. All we see is firefighters, emergency personnel and fire trucks."

Though Wilkinson said she and her husband are staying put — for now — many area businesses have closed and people who had vacation rental homes are canceling plans, local business owners said.

"This fire, it's killing our financial picture," said Corinna Loh, whose family owns the still-open Iron Door Saloon and Grill in Groveland. "This is our high season, and it has gone to nothing, we're really hurting."

Loh said most of her employees have left town. And the family's Spinning Wheel Ranch, where they rent cabins to tourists, also has been evacuated because it's directly in the line of fire. Two outbuildings have burned at the ranch, Loh said, and she still has no word whether the house and cabins survived.

"We're all just standing on eggshells, waiting," Loh said.

The governor's emergency declaration finding "conditions of extreme peril to the safety of persons and property" frees up funds and firefighting resources and helps Tuolumne County in seeking federal disaster relief.

Park officials said the fire has not impacted the park itself, which can still be accessed via state Routes 140 and 41 from the west, as well as State Route 120 from the east side.

Yosemite Valley is clear of smoke, all accommodations and attractions are open, and campgrounds are full, said park spokesman Scott Gediman. During summer weekdays, the park gets up to 15,000 visitors.

"The fire is totally outside the park," Gediman said. "The park's very busy, people are here. There's no reason that they should not come."

The Yosemite County Tourism Bureau based in Mariposa has been helping tourists displaced by the fire to find new accommodations in other park-area towns, said director Terry Selk.

In Yellowstone National Park, five wildfires have been burned about 18 square miles of mostly remote areas on the 25th anniversary of the infamous 1988 fires that burned more than 1,200 square miles inside Yellowstone, or more than a third of the park.

The vast areas that burned that year remain obvious to anybody who drives through. The trees in the burn areas are a lot shorter.

This summer's fires haven't been anywhere near that disruptive. The biggest fire in Yellowstone, one that has burned about 12 square miles in the Hayden Valley area, for a time Tuesday closed the road that follows the Yellowstone River between Fishing Bridge and Canyon Village. By Wednesday, the road had reopened.